The source of morality

The source of morality

We humans struggle with the idea of a morality without God. It is important to us to know right from wrong. If right and wrong are mere human inventions, then they have no absolute value. They are arbitrary. Meaningless. We can choose not to follow the moral rules with no divine consequences. Or change a wrong into a right at will. We need some kind of unmovable source for morality. An ultimate arbiter high above us. A pure source. Nietzsche wrote about the need for a God as the source of absolute morality. The reverend Al Sharpton asked atheist Christopher Hitchens the following question: If there is no supervisory being then what do we base morality on? (timestamp 40min).

So how do we explore this issue? We can do it by asking the right questions.

What is morality?

Where could it have come from if not from God?

Can we live with a man-made morality?

Before we answer these questions we can do a little mental parlor trick. We side step onto a similar and related issue. The issue of rights and laws. Let's look for example at the right to vote. In one country women are allowed to vote, in another they are not. And what about driving? In some nations teens of 16+ can drive, in others you have to be at least 18+. Immediately we can see variation popping up. So how would a right or law come into existence? Well we can try it for ourselves.

Suppose you have some stuff, and i have some stuff. When you are gone, i could take your stuff. However, if i am gone, you could do the same to me. Thus we agree upon a right. The right to property. And the law against taking it without consent, an action we name theft. We could also invent some extra laws concerning the right to property.  For instance a law of inheritance.

Rights and laws are clearly a form of agreement between humans. We can deduce this from their arbitrary nature. Rights and laws vary from nation to nation, from culture to culture, sometimes even from city to city. Arbitrary means according to someones will, that of an arbiter. In the example the arbiters were you and me. For most rights and laws the arbiters are those in power. Of course we could argue that rights and laws are always derived from a moral code, and this code is always divine. Perhaps. Does that hold for municipal parking rights as well? Just as in our example we can see rights and laws being made up by people, such as local governments and senates. We can actually see the creation process if we watch CSPAN. They are also changed when feedback is received from the populace, or even discarded. There is nothing divine about them.

Now let's go back to morality. What is it that it is? Wikipedia gives this definition:

Morality (from Latin: moralitas, lit. 'manner, character, proper behavior') is the differentiation of intentions, decisions and actions between those that are distinguished as proper and those that are improper.

Morality can be a body of standards or principles derived from a code of conduct from a particular philosophy, religion or culture, or it can derive from a standard that a person believes should be universal. Morality may also be specifically synonymous with "goodness" or "rightness"

Does that sound familiar? Again there is some kind of arbiter that decides on what is what. In theory this could be a human, a God, neither, or both. We can see that morals vary from culture to culture, nation to nation and religion to religion. In some ancient religions sacrifice was seen as good, up to the point of actual human sacrifice, willing or otherwise. In others taking a life is wrong no matter what. In both the Islamic and Buddhist faith the kind treatment of animals is a core virtue. This moral standard or principle provides the means to differentiate between specific treatments of animals. It is however not a core virtue of Christianity. That does not mean it can't be derived from other Christian virtues such as justice. The point is to note the difference.

And now we come to the traditional source of morality: religion. There are many different faiths. Some are mutually exclusive, some only partly so. Which religion is right? If you believe in a specific religion you are presented with the following conundrum in the form of 3 possibilities.

1. One of the religions is right. All the others are wrong. So there is a chance that you believe in a something man-made.

2. All religions have some truth to them. However no one has come across the completely true religion yet.

3. All religions are wrong. Again, the true faith has not been found yet.

4. Religion is a human phenomenon which revolves around control. The control over our lives and deaths. All religions can be explained in terms of primitive to modern. While primitive religions deal with control over the immediate physical environment, advanced religions deal with the social environment. For small scale primitive societies survival is determined by such things as the weather and the hunt, for large scale advanced societies by how neighbors treat each other. To determine a right and a wrong above what any two neighbors might decide on, an absolute source is needed. Only a deity can provides this.
5. God has given different societies different religions over time because of ... reasons.

Since for at least some religions it is true that they are either false or partly incorrect, we can deduce that their moral codes can be completely or partly man made.

We have shown that the body of rights and laws that a society has is at least to some extent man made. We did this by pointing out the arbitrary nature, and by showing a process by which man can make them. This insight can now be extended to morality. Morality also seems to vary from religion to religion and could be agreed upon by humans via the same process.

The point is that it is at least possible for any given morality to be man made. And thus we arrive at the final question. Can we live with the idea of a man made morality? We certainly can live with the practice of man-making morality. After all some societies must believe in a (partly) wrong religion. However we can never attach any kind of absolutism to something that is man made because of the arbitrary nature. Something that we know to be changeable can never hold the same value when it comes to right and wrong as a divine rulebook could. After all we can always change things and then a wrong could become a right. Living with the notion of a man made morality will therefore be more difficult for the time being, if we choose to adopt this notion. Perhaps we could get used to it in time..